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It is a peculiarity of the American mind that it regards any excursion into the truth as an adventure into cynicism.
H. L. Mencken
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H. L. Mencken
Age: 75 †
Born: 1880
Born: September 12
Died: 1956
Died: January 29
Autobiographer
Essayist
Historian
Journalist
Linguist
Literary Critic
Satirist
Social Critic
Writer
Baltimore
Maryland
Henry Louis Mencken
Adventure
Regard
American
Excursion
Truth
Peculiarity
Mind
Excursions
Regards
Cynicism
More quotes by H. L. Mencken
One seldom discovers a true believer that is worth knowing.
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If x is the population of the United States and y is the degree of imbecility of the average American, then democracy is the theory that x times y is less than y
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The smallest atom of truth represents some man's bitter toil and agony for every ponderable chunk of it there is a brave truth-seeker's grave upon some lonely ash-dump and a soul roasting in hell.
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[A formula for answering controversial letters -- without even reading the letters:] Dear Sir (or Madame): You may be right.
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Watching two women kiss is like watching two prizefighters shake hands.
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I believe that religion, generally speaking, has been a curse to mankind - that its modest and greatly overestimated services on the ethical side have been more than overcome by the damage it has done to clear and honest thinking.
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There are no institutions in America: there are only fashions.
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To the extent that I am genuinely educated, I am suspicious of all the things that the average citizen believes and the average pedagogue teaches.
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Philosophy first constructs a scheme of happiness and then tries to fit the world to it.
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When fanatics are on top there is no limit to oppression.
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Legend: A lie that has attained the dignity of age.
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Not by accident, you may be sure, do the Christian Scriptures make the father of knowledge a serpent - slimy, sneaking and abominable.
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Congress consists of one-third, more or less, scoundrels two-thirds, more or less, idiots and three-thirds, more or less, poltroons.
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I know some who are constantly drunk on books as other men are drunk on whiskey.
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The most satisfying and ecstatic faith is almost purely agnostic. It trusts absolutely without professing to know at all.
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Unionism, seldom if ever, uses such powers as it has to ensure better work almost always it devotes a large part of that power to safeguard bad work.
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The great artists of the world are never Puritans, and seldom even ordinarily respectable.
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If the average man is made in God's image, then a man such as Beethoven or Aristotle is plainly superior to God, and so God may be jealous of him, and eager to see his superiority perish with his bodily frame.
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Every autobiography ... becomes an absorbing work of fiction, with something of the charm of a cryptogram.
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In the duel of sex woman fights from a dreadnought and man from an open raft.
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